Brandon Donnelly

Daily insights for city builders, delivered every morning at 6 AM ET. I’m Brandon Donnelly — a Toronto-based real estate developer and founder of Globizen. I’ve been writing here since 2013.

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Tag: brent toderian

  • Are car tunnels the solution to traffic congestion?

    Elon Musk recently posted this Twitter survey asking if we, the people, would like “super safe, Earthquake-proof tunnels under [our] cities to solve traffic.” It was leading in that the “no” response was, “No, I like traffic.” And it was initially vague in that it wasn’t clear how these tunnels would be used. Though, most of us could probably guess. Elon later added in the thread that these road tunnels would be for zero emission vehicles only and they would be limited to EVs (from all auto companies, not just Tesla). Finally, Elon stated that these tunnels are not intended to replace other solutions, such as light rail, rather to supplement them.

    At the time of writing this post, nearly 1.5 million people had responded to the survey and about 67% of them said “definitely” to Earthquake-proof tunnels. Elon’s reaction: “Stop whining, subway Stalinists, the people have spoken.” Notwithstanding the majority, this is a divisive topic and the reactions are mixed. City planner Brent Toderian responded by saying that this “solution” would merely result in more cars, more driving, and more emissions. Steve Jurvetson, on the other hand, argued that this would be the cheapest way to add lanes and prepare for the inevitable EV-only future. (Steve sits on Tesla’s board and recently launched a venture fund that, among other things, invests in sustainable mobility.)

    The crux of this divide is a view about how cities should work. And it often becomes like dogma. Is it optimal for us to all be driving around in individual vehicles — EV or not? Will autonomous vehicles actually help solve the traffic problem? Or is building on the backbone of mass transit the only way to properly design a big and efficient city? Whether it’s lip service or not, Elon seems to acknowledge that both cars and transit are important, and that both can work together to supplement each other.

    What is clear to me is that cities, at the scale of say Tokyo, wouldn’t function nearly as efficiently if it weren’t for their extensive fixed rail networks. At the same time, there are many cities (or portions of cities) that do not have the prerequisite population and employment densities to support this same level of transit investment. And that has created a strong pull away from transit (and active transport such as cycling) toward private vehicles. Sprawling cities signal to people that they should probably be driving. This is one of the reasons why land use should never be separated from mobility discussions.

    How autonomous vehicles change all of this remains to be seen. Though I do think it will make cars less private and more public transit-like. Studies show that most of us are pretty good at coming up with incremental improvements to the things we already know and understand. i.e. This is how I would make this car better. But we’re far worse at coming up with and predicting tectonic shifts in the landscape. And autonomy is probably one of those shifts. But as long as our built form remains heterogeneous, I am inclined to believe that a mixture of mobility solutions will be needed. Maybe that means car tunnels. Or maybe it doesn’t.

    Photo by Ricardo Gomez Angel on Unsplash

  • Look what fits in a parking lot

    Brent Toderian likes to start Twitter hashtags that revolve around city building. One of his most recent is #LookWhatFitsInAParkingLot. For this one, he asked the Twittersphere to consider the things we love in cities that might fit inside a parking lot.

    Here is one of the best responses — Dodger Stadium edition:

    https://twitter.com/pw3n/status/1176349879154556931?s=20

    Venice, Amsterdam, and Shibuya (Tokyo) were all overlaid — at the same scale — on the surface parking surrounding Dodger Stadium. There are about 16,000 parking spaces, which actually take up more land than the stadium itself.

    To be fair, I bet if you overlaid parts of Los Angeles on this same parking, it would look similarly astounding. But that shouldn’t change what you take away from this post: parking is very land consumptive.

  • Height vs. density

    This Planetizen article (2014) by Brent Toderian surfaced over the weekend. It is about tall buildings and why we should be focused more on how they are designed, as opposed to just how tall they are. Brent talks about this in terms of “density done well.”

    One of the things that is often misunderstood when it comes to tall buildings is the relationship between height and density. It is often assumed that the two are perfectly correlated; but they’re not, which is why I like this quote from the above article:

    “Height and density have a relationship, one that can be over-simplified or mischaracterized, but they aren’t the same thing – you can have density without height, and yes, you can have height without density.” -Brent Toderian

    Part of the challenge is that density is a more nuanced metric. Height, on the other hand, is a lot easier to understand. How tall is this building? Oh, it is x storeys tall. But that’s only one piece of the puzzle.

    Photo by Erwan Hesry on Unsplash

  • Great things that happened on transit

    Elon Musk’s apparent distaste for public transit and random strangers prompted a Twitter battle last week. Though for the record, Musk later clarified that he loves trains, most subways and London buses.

    Transit planner Jarrett Walker retorted that Elon’s views are the “essence of elite projection”. What’s good for Elon Musk may not, in fact, be good for the broader society. Elon responded by calling him an idiot.

    All of this prompted Brent Toderian – city planner and former chief planner of Vancouver – to initiate the hashtag: #GreatThingsThatHappenedOnTransit. It then took off and the transit stories started pouring in.

    Not surprisingly, this has been getting a lot of attention. It’s Elon Musk after all. But billionaire celebrities aside, it does serve as a good example of the two sides of this debate.

    Some people seem to think that I am anti-car. I can see why some people might think that, but I am not anti-car. I love nice cars. And I love nice trains. What I value first and foremost is the city. 

    The kind of city you can build on the backbone of transit is very different than the kind of city that gets built around the car. And as a rule of thumb, I prefer the former over the latter.

    But this is not to say that the public transit model is perfect. It’s far from perfect for many reasons. And it can get even more imperfect when we don’t pair it with the right land use policies.

    Deploying heavy rail through low density areas – that are by design inhospitable to car-less humans – will not magically flip the modal split. Public transport alone cannot solve that problem.

    At the same time, if you’re a regular reader of this blog you’ll know that I am enamoured by the possibilities of autonomous electric vehicles. I am not assuming that the “car” of tomorrow will look and perform anything like the car of today.

    Mobility is such an exciting space right now.

  • 100 books for city geeks

    If you’re a city geek looking for a good book to read, head over to Planetizen and check out Brent Toderian’s list of the 100 best books on city-making. Toderian was formerly Chief Planner for the City of Vancouver.

    I have a good number of those books on my own bookshelf, but also many that I should really read. I think I’ll start with #1: Cities for People by Jan Gehl.

    Here’s the forward for that book by British architect, Richard Rogers:

    “Cities are the places where people meet to exchange ideas, trade, or simply relax and enjoy themselves. A city‘s public domain — its streets, squares, and parks — is the stage and the catalyst for these activities. Jan Gehl, the doyen of public-space design, has a deep understanding of how we use the public domain and off ers us the tools we need to improve the design of public spaces and, as a consequence, the quality of our lives in cities.

    The compact city — with development grouped around public transport, walking, and cycling — is the only environmentally sustainable form of city. However, for population densities to increase and for walking and cycling to be widespread, a city must increase the quantity and quality of well-planned beautiful public spaces that are human in scale, sustainable, healthy, safe, and lively.

    Cities — like books — can be read, and Jan Gehl understands their language. The street, the footpath, the square, and the park are the grammar of the city; they provide the structure that enables cities to come to life, and to encourage and accommodate diverse activities, from the quiet and contemplative to the noisy and busy. A humane city — with carefully designed streets, squares, and parks — creates pleasure for visitors and passers-by, as well as for those who live, work, and play there every day.

    Everyone should have the right to easily accessible open spaces, just as they have a right to clean water. Everyone should be able to see a tree from their window, or to sit on a bench close to their home with a play space for children, or to walk to a park within ten minutes. Well-designed neighborhoods inspire the people who live in them, whilst poorly designed cities brutalize their citizens. As Jan says: “We shape cities, and they shape us.”

    No one has examined the morphology and use of public space to the extent that Jan Gehl has. Anyone who reads this book will get a valuable insight into his astonishingly perceptive understanding of the relationship between public spaces and civic society, and how the two are inextricably intertwined.”